The undercroft of the Lincoln Memorial is seen during a tour in Washington, Monday, Feb. 15, 2016, after a ceremony announcing David Rubenstein's gift to the National Park Foundation's Centennial Campaign... (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

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The Lincoln Memorial will be getting a much-needed facelift in the coming years thanks to an $18.5 million donation from one history-loving philanthropist, CNN reports. "Lincoln deserves to have his memorial in tip-top shape," David Rubenstein tells the AP. The president of the National Park Foundation admits to the Washington Post the nearly 100-year-old memorial has gotten a bit "run-down" since it first opened. The Park Service plans to use the Rubenstein's donation to clean the memorial, fix its roof, update its restrooms, make its exhibit area 20 times larger, restore its murals, and install an elevator to improve access. The restoration project will also allow visitors to see below the monument, where the original builders left charcoal graffiti, including a caricature of President Taft.

“I’m very honored as an American to be able to contribute in this way,” the Post quotes Rubenstein during the announcement of his donation Monday. The project is likely to be the biggest renovation to the Lincoln Memorial, which receives 7 million visitors per year, since it opened. In the past, Rubenstein has donated more than $40 million to repair the Washington Monument, US Marine Corps War Memorial, the White House Visitor Center, James Madison's home, and the Arlington House. He even gave $9 million to help the National Zoo keep its pandas. The Park Service currently has $12 billion in repairs it's been putting off. The National Park Foundation expects to raise about $100 million in donations this year.

I heard the philanthropist had one major stipulating.. The stone that is carved with the emancipation proclamation will be Re Cut… To REMOVE the Lincoln freed the “slaves of rebelling states” ONLY… It will be to finally seal the changing of history to read as we want it to read.. So we can continue to deny that the North was the original home of slavery.. It will soon become a historical fact .. That Slaves only existed in the South.. Just trying to get my daily trolling in..

tpvero

Feb 17, 2016 2:36 AM CST

"The philanthropist is best known as co-founder and co-chief executive officer of The Carlyle Group, a global private equity investment company based in Washington D.C. The Carlyle Group,, buyout firm, is one of the nation's largest defense contractors. It has billions of dollars at its disposal. President George Herbert Walker Bush is on the payroll too. The firm also has about a dozen investors from Saudi Arabia, including, until recently, the bin Laden family. Yes, those bin Ladens. Is it any wonder that Internet sites are rife with stories about Carlyle's shadowy, corrupt global network? And it's not just wackos. "Be careful," a tech entrepreneur in Silicon Valley wrote in an e-mail when he learned I was doing a story on Carlyle. "The rabbit hole runs really deep on this one.'' " http://www.rense.com/general21/car.htm Notable Quote: "I analogize private equity to sex ... You realize there were certain things you shouldn't do, but the urge is there and you can’t resist." (speaking at Harvard Business School about the buyout bubble)- David M. Rubenstein

tpvero

Feb 17, 2016 1:35 AM CST

tpvero does have an opinion. If the USA did not have to give Israel $5 BILLION , a year we would not have to accept charity from grandstanding billionaires who incidentally probably keeps AIPAC in funds also. AIPAC is lobby organization of wealthy American Jewish businesspeople who buy the US congress with campaign funds. Our congress is then expected to appropriate large sums of money to Israel each year. Israel uses the money to ethnic cleanse the Palestinians, a genocide that has been going on since 1948. This would be while people like Ppointy accuse me of being a Nazi, when it is clear that the Israeli are the only Nazi-like nation on the planet. The United Nations thinks Israel is committing war crimes! Excuse me if I wan't to stop genocide which is not OK because American Jews want to support another country. Ppointy should stop hating gentiles so much in favor of supporting another nation he would never move to and support from inside. He likes to give gentile money away and call people derogatory names designed to silence them.